Consultants appointed to bring Greenway across Shannon

Consultants have been appointed to continue the greenway in Athlone to the western bank of the River Shannon.

The project, from the White Gates on the Ballymahon Road, includes the Greenway bridge between the Athlone Marina and the Luan Gallery.

It will be carried out by Roughan and O’Donovan/AECOM alliance.

The appointment of the consultants comes as the Greenway reached a significant milestone, opening all the way from Athlone to Maynooth. The last sections between the two towns were completed in recent weeks, at Cloncurry and Moyvalley in Kildare.

It means the 107km Athlone to Maynooth stretch is now the longest Greenway in Ireland, longer than the Westport and Waterford Greenways combined.

The consultants who will be working to extend it in Athlone will initially focus on installing the new greenway surface and public lighting between the White Gates and Athlone Marina.

This is due to be carried out over the next nine months, with this stretch of the Greenway now expected to open to the public next summer.

Part of this section - a €4m underpass beneath the active train line at Montree - was put in place last Easter.

The same consultants will be carrying out the detailed design and advance works on the new bridge over the course of 2020, and if funding is made available it's hoped construction of the bridge will then start in 2021.

Once construction gets underway, the bridge is expected to take twelve months to complete.

Separately, tenders have been sought for a contractor to work on the Greenway project from the west side of Athlone as far as Galway, and it's expected that a contractor will be appointed for this stretch of the project at some stage in the coming months.

A public project office for the Athlone to Galway section is expected to be located in the office space above Ballinasloe Library on Society Street, subject to approval from Galway County Council.

Roscommon Fine Gael Senator Maura Hopkins welcomed the location for the office in Ballinasloe, saying it was "essential that communities are engaged with at the earliest possible stage to ensure maximum support for this project."

She said the Athlone to Galway Greenway has the potential to be "the flagship tourism offering" for Ballinasloe and the wider region.

"In particular, the Athlone to Ballinasloe section of this Greenway has so much to offer in terms of tourism development. 

"The wake house at Nure, the Clonmacnoise monastic site, Shannonbridge, as well as the wealth of history which exists in Ballinasloe itself, should all be key sites of interest on this national greenway route," said Senator Hopkins.